CANTON — As a local bookstore opens a new chapter, area writers looking to self-publish their works can now find the resources they need.

While Yawn’s Books and More Inc. only moved a short distance away from its previous address of 210 East Main St. to 198 North St., store owner Farris Yawn said the Canton-based bookstore relocated to a smaller site in an attempt to focus more on the publishing side of the business.

The site on East Main, where the bookstore had operated since 2004, is now empty, but the new business location is up and running.

“The bookstore was something I always wanted to do — a lifelong dream. The publishing company grew out of the bookstore. It has become a success,” Yawn said. “We decided to consolidate our business and concentrate on the areas of our business that were successful.”

Yawn’s has published more than 100 books by at least 50 authors since its inception a few years ago, Yawn said.

Yawn’s Publishing is a member of the Independent Book Publishers Association, the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, the Southeast Independent Booksellers, and the American Booksellers Association.

The publishing business generally publishes works revolving around local history and biographies, but is also a source for publishing manuscripts for children’s books, cookbooks, fiction books, non-fiction books and political books, according to their website.

“We have several new books in the works (for this year),” Yawn said.

A few of the most recently released books by the company include Marguerite Cline’s “The Glory Days of WCHK,” W.F. Bell and Marcus Beavers’ “Buffington and Macedonia in Days Gone By,” and Jim McFarland’s “The Potters of Orange.”

In “The Glory Days of WCHK,” Cline, an award-winning columnist and former mayor of Waleska, talks about a hometown radio station built in Canton and is mainly based on the memories of Byron Dobbs.

“Buffington and Macedonia in Days Gone By” is “the story of country people dedicated to faith, family, and community located in east-central Cherokee County” according to its description on Yawn’s Publishing’s website; Bell is a native of Canton and Beavers is a resident of Macedonia.

McFarland’s “The Potters of Orange” gives an overview — in words and pictures — to a group of potters that lived in Cherokee County for more than a century; McFarland is a Canton native and an avid collector of Cherokee County art and antiques according to his biography on Yawn’s Publishing’s website.

For more information about Yawn’s Publishing, visit its website at www.yawnspublishing.com

Yawn’s Publishing is open Monday through Saturday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.

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